And It All Came Tumbling Down
by Nightshade2412
Summary: What does MI6 run on? If Alex can work it out, he can bring them to their knees. Or get some time off over the winter holidays. Really, that's all he's asking for. (For SpyFest Fic Exchange.)


**A.N. Happy new year! Happy new _decade! _Here's part one of two for my fic-exchange story, for the prompt: "What does MI6 run on? (e.g. tea, secrets, lies, etc.)". It's been great fun thinking of different ways to explore that theme, but my thoughts on plot and structure did end up in a bit of a mess, so I'm splitting the fic in two rather than rush the rest too much - I intend to get it done within a day or too, though. Hopefully you enjoy this chapter. I have no idea how to describe it, so read on and see for yourself!**

**I don't own Alex Rider. Rated T for language and the dubious morals of basically all these characters.**

* * *

It was eight o'clock on the longest night of the year, the latest Alex had ever found himself at the Royal and General bank. The sun had disappeared hours ago, and he'd expected the employees here would've done the same by now, but it felt the same as ever. Maybe it didn't creep him out now because it _always_ creeped him out. There was a high enough baseline that a different view from the window and a few more yawns didn't make it that much weirder.

"Focus, Mr Rider," Crawley sighed, tapping his pen on the report Alex was supposed to be filling out.

"I do _favours _for you. Paperwork isn't supposed to be one of them. I'm not an _employee _here, after all," Alex said, glaring at him. "I've been awake at least thirty-six hours now, you really expect me to focus on this?

"Quicker you get it done, quicker you can go home," Crawley answered.

"The least you could do is give me a cup of tea," Alex muttered.

"Get it yourself, Crawley said, turning back pointedly to his own, much thicker stack of papers. "Common room's at the end of the corridor."

Alex stood, scraping his chair on purpose just to see the man wince, and waited until he was out of the room to say "Common room. _What._"

He let the words hang in the air, but they didn't get any more believable, so he got moving, the better to see it for himself.

There was one other person there when he got there, already fiddling with the hot water dispenser. He hung back in the doorway a moment, not wanting to deal with the awkward questions he got as a result of being a teenager in a top secret office. But the man looked up, and he recognised him as Ben Daniels.

"Hey, Alex. Tea?"

"Yeah," he said, walking over. "That'd be great."

Ben showed him how everything worked, and then leaned against the table and took a sip from his own cup as he watched Alex stir in milk and sugar.

"If we didn't have tea, England would fall," he joked. "Or I would, anyway."

"Absolutely," Alex agreed, blowing on the contents of his own mug. "I swear, I'm about to fall asleep."

Ben ruffled his hair as he left. "Happy holidays, Alex. Get outta here soon and don't let them drag you back in before the new year, ok?"

Alex nodded, and waited there a moment more, swaying on his feet from exhaustion before he dragged himself back out.

* * *

Daniels was right - there was no way he'd have made it through the report without falling asleep if it weren't for the tea. It still wasn't enough to satisfy Crawley, though. He wanted Alex back into the office in a couple days time to go over some more paperwork.

"That's not even what I'm here for," he protested again. "And it's nearly Christmas."

"If we're still working, you can too," Crawley said.

Alex narrowed his eyes at that. There was an idea in there somewhere, but he was too tired to work it out. No matter. He still had a whole day free to flesh out the details - even if he planned to spend half of it sleeping.

* * *

Smithers didn't work for MI6 anymore, and in the interests of not being forced to work for anyone else, either, he'd permanently ditched his disguise and his name, and left the country for somewhere sunnier. But he'd left a way for Alex to get in touch - "Just in case".

This probably wasn't exactly what Smithers had had in mind when he made the offer, but he laughed heartily when he heard what Alex wanted, and gave him the information he asked for, and some he didn't, like where to get a signal jammer, how to increase the range and the frequency that the security cameras ran on.

"I should probably point out that this all highly illegal," he added, "so if anyone asks, I had nothing to do with it."  
"If they want to prosecute me, they'll have to explain what I'm doing there in the first place," Alex said, and that was that.

Operation Liverpool Street Tea Party was a go.

* * *

Alex could really understand why people complained about paperwork after another two hours spent in a cramped room with Crawley. At first he'd thought that Crawley, like Blunt, didn't want to introduce any personal touches into his office. Now he realised that the tottering piles of files and neatly organised stationary said all that was needed about the man.

"Stay here and finish filling out those forms," Crawley said. "I've got to go deal with something elsewhere"

Alex resisted the temptation to smirk and touch the jammer in his pocket that he'd set off a few minutes ago, and waited another minute after he left, before grabbing his bag and sneaking out after him.

He glanced down at the list of places where teabags were kept in the building. There were a lot of them; he'd have to move fast.

* * *

He'd only just got his breathing under control when Crawley came stomping back into the office, and kept his head down, worried that it would still be flushed enough to give him away.

"There was a security breach," Crawley said. "Did you see anything unusual?"

"Only your dalmatian-shaped eraser," Alex said. "Have you been using the side with the spots more in the hope of rubbing them off so it looks more like Barker?"

Crawley glared. "This is serious. The cameras have been down for over ten minutes already. Smithers would've sorted it by now, but- Well. There's a new kid in charge down there now."

Alex nodded in commiseration. He hadn't had any missions without gadgets from Smithers yet, and he was praying he'd never have to. He was also hoping the head movement would distract from the hand sneaking under the table to switch the jammer off.

His bag was by his feet; he nudged it a little further out of sight, so Crawley wouldn't see that it was now bulging outwards.

"Mrs Jones wants to see you when you're done," Crawley added.

He dragged his feet all the way there, hoping the lack of tea would stop her functioning before she could tell him anything else he didn't want to hear.

* * *

Mrs Jones swallowed her peppermint and cleared her throat, the only sign of discomfort she allowed herself at the situation: Alex on one side of the desk, her on the other. Blunt's old chair. He was gone, but nothing had really changed.

"It's quite a simple task, really."

When she spoke, her tone was all business. She was trying to dress it up pretty, but it was a poor effort. They both knew it didn't matter in the end.

"What do you want?" Alex sighed. He didn't have the patience for this, either.

"There has been a spate of cyber attacks lately. Hackers, trying to access some of the most classified documents in the country. They got through eventually, but not without leaving enough of a trail for the analysts at GCHQ to trace back to them. It's already a disaster, of course, but we know who's pulling the strings - Fyodor Bykov. He's like the Russian equivalent of Sir Graham Adair; he's got fingers in a lot of pies, but few people have heard of him. There's still a chance we could stop this?"

"Stop _what._"

"That's classified."

Alex raised his eyebrows, incredulous. Mrs Jones blinked, like she didn't know what he was getting at.

He was _so done_ with intelligence agencies.

"I don't see what you need me for," he said, choosing to move on. "I had to rush through those computer books for the _Stormbreaker _mission, and a lot has happened since then. I don't think I'd be able to do anything practical. Not like they teach that stuff at school," he added pointedly. "Or maybe they do. I've missed a lot of classes."

"Once it's out, it's out," Mrs Jones said, doing a valiant job of ignoring his jabs. "The cyber security specialists are working double time, but they're never going to be able to close everything off again." She leaned forward and held his gaze. "But there's a human being at the end of this. And that's what the heart of this organisation is about. The personal connection. The things people can do and machines can't, whether good or bad. The right person might be able to- to appeal to his better nature, to use a cliché."

"Right." Alex swallowed. "But why does that person have to be me?"

"Bykov had a grandson about your age. He looked a lot like you. He died a few months ago. They were very close; it's the quickest way to spark a personal connection, and we don't have time to mess around. He's holding a visit for a select group of children tomorrow - it's good for his publicity, which he's been focusing on more recently, possibly angling for a promotion. Go to it, ask the right questions, push a few buttons. Hopefully it'll be enough. If not, we'll have to resort to more serious methods."

Alex wanted to ask what those methods were. And what questions he should ask. And why she thought there was any hope in hell that that would be enough. But as he opened his mouth, he thought of another Russian man who had seen Alex as a replacement for a lost family member, and the memory of what had happened when Alex had failed to fill that gap crashed over him.

He fixed his gaze on a mark on the wall behind Jones, and tried to remember how to breathe. He barely knew what was happening. It was strange; he didn't think about Sarov that often, at least not now with time and a thousand new nightmares between them. But he knew he couldn't cope with a repeat performance.

"No, fuck you, Jones," Alex said, when he found his tongue. "Fuck you. I'm not doing it."

"I swear, Alex, that's all I'm asking," she said, taken aback. "It's quick and simple, and perfectly safe. I know we haven't had the best track record when telling you that before - the boy who cried wolf in reverse, I suppose. But you'll be with other children the whole time, and we have no reason to suspect that you'll be in danger. Even going there as a spy - well, he's powerful, and intelligent, and he could do our country a lot of damage. But physical violence isn't his style."

"Find someone else."

"There is no one else."

"Uh huh. So what happened to all those other people on your payroll? Who are _being paid_."

"If it's money you're after-"

"No! What don't you get? No. I'm not going to exploit some guy's dead family just for a few documents you won't even tell me about." He paused. "Not that I'd complain, if you felt like compensating me."

She stared him down, lips a thin line.

"No," he said again, and got up to walk out before she could tell him what she had as blackmail this time.

The door refused to budge. He whipped back round, furious, to see Mrs Jones bringing her hand back above the desk.

"Unlock the door," he demanded.

"In a moment," she said. "I just don't think you understand fully. I have a serious threat to the country that could escalate any moment now, and I don't have time to come up with another solution. And _you_ \- well, please don't make me spell it out. You know what we can do."

He did know. And he also knew that, even if Mrs Jones was reluctant to say it explicitly, still trying to convince herself that she wasn't as morally dubious as her predecessor. He should force her to come up with a threat.

But he knew that she would do it, if he didn't give in now. And she'd go through with it, if he continued to refuse. She couldn't afford to have him anywhere but under her thumb. And god, enough people were being hurt by this.

"Fuck you," he repeated. It didn't help.

"You'll fly out tonight," she said, pressing the button to unlock the door. "Oh, and Alex?"

He raised his eyebrows.

"That issue with the cameras was just some prankster stealing all the teabags in the building," she said. "I'm not sure what they were trying to accomplish by that, but," she shrugged, "personally, tea just doesn't cut it for me." She pressed another hidden button. "Miss Pickering? Double espresso, two sugars."

The smirk she sent him made Alex certain she knew it was him.

"Merry Christmas," he bit out, and left before she could tell him anything else.


End file.
